


smear

by lacksley



Category: M&M's Commercials, TV Commercials
Genre: Angst, Crack Treated Seriously, Existential Angst, Existential Crisis, Heavy Angst, Historical References, I Can't Believe I Wrote This, Soldiers, Stream of Consciousness, War
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-26
Updated: 2017-05-26
Packaged: 2018-11-05 07:57:14
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11009217
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lacksley/pseuds/lacksley
Summary: You lost."In 1995, tan M&Ms were discontinued to be replaced by blue." -M&M's - Wikipedia.





	smear

**Author's Note:**

  * For [SoVeryAverageMe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/SoVeryAverageMe/gifts), [Pugglemuggle](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Pugglemuggle/gifts).



You’re lost. 

That’s what you are. 

_ You’re lost. _

 You lost.

It wasn’t in the cards, they said. They told you.

You lost.

They kicked you out, “retired” and now you’re nothing. 

You lost. 

You’re a ghost, an empty shell, melting in the pocket of a forgotten soldier that died on a bloodsoaked field in a foreign country. 

You lost. 

There were wars you didn’t even know about, but they were fought with statistics and research instead of guns and mettle. 

You lost. 

You weren’t even the first one. There were others before you, with different faces and different markings and colors and _you_ replaced _them_ and you thought _you_ were the lucky one, to be here, to be safe and loved by the people that ate you up. 

You lost. 

There are still fragments. Collectors, stale, garbage, hidden. Buried in the dirt, remnants in a formaldehyde stomach, skeleton bones coated in a candy shell. 

You lost. 

War brought you, war kept you, and an election took you away. Now you are forgotten, a trivia fact, the old lamenting the loss of the good old days when _everything_ was at stake instead of just what was yours.  

You lost. 

The others don’t remember. They _can’t._ You exist in limbo, your power drawn from old photographs and wasting memories. They have been molded by this new world, they are part of it. They have stolen its shape and its language and speak as celebutantes and movie stars and you remember when movies were a window to another world, an escape from the crushing darkness of the fight and the rattling cages they put you in, because _you_ don’t melt, you never did. 

You lost. 

The one that took your place doesn’t know. How could he? You couldn’t tell him. You only saw him on the screens, the bright flashing numbers telling you to call now, vote now, be _now_ and you _can’t_ because they _told_ you that you _weren’t._  

You lost. 

You weren’t to their liking anymore. You were too similar to _her_ , they said, but wasn’t it the other way around? You were here from the beginning, before any of the others, and you _don’t_ think of _Violet,_ you _can’t,_ it wasn’t your _fault_ it wasn’t in your _control_ and you didn’t have a _choice,_ for how could you choose not to be born, how could you choose _not_ to exist? 

You lost. 

But you didn’t exist, not really. The others didn’t either, until you were gone. That’s when it started. The eyes, the mouths, the boneless limbs that twisted in unnatural directions. It was all unnatural, _you are artificial,_ but you’ve seen limbs bent in ways they shouldn’t, insides on the outside from the wrong side, the downside of being old, the upside of being gone, and you are gone, you’re gone, _you’re gone you’re gone you’re—_  

—lost. 

Maybe it’s okay, maybe you’ll be fine. It’s been so long, it’s been years, decades. Maybe you’ve earned your rest. To fade into the place where things go to die. You know it’s not really a place, because once you’ve made it there you don’t exist anymore. Your mind can’t make it real because you’re gone. The colors are faded and dull, a gleam that’s lost it’s shine. Crushed candy melting on a hot sidewalk. Army fatigues, mess halls, movie nights. Marching boots caked in mud and spilled fluids and the sound of gunfire but you’ve gone deaf in your old age, you never had ears to hear with in the first place. Your body is smooth and round and you open your mouth to cry out in fear of the unknown and the ending of your being but you have no lungs, no throat to scream out to the uncaring marketing team that thought Tan was _too similar_ to Brown and the public that forgot about you, that whines in half-hearted nostalgia but doesn’t _care_ enough to save you, only _remember you_ and wax about how much they _miss you_ but you’re _leaving,_ you’re _dying and they don’t care about you they don’t care they don’t care about you_ — 

—lost.

**Author's Note:**

> end me


End file.
